I have a folder on my desktop that reads Diary Of A 124 LB Fat Chick. It’s a piece I’ve been working on intermittently since arriving in North America from Thailand last year. The topic evokes a potent mix of rage meets shame meets frustration meets helplessness within me. This all adds to why I haven’t published it until today.
In honour of Eating Disorders Awareness Week which occurred last month, I’ve decided to publish it raw. I could edit the piece, make it less emotional and more fluid but I’ve decided against it. The form very much addresses the headspace I was experiencing at the time and emotions I suspect others may deal with.
Diary of a 124 LB Fat Chick
This is what sequentially came to mind in my Polynesian dance class tonight:
- I’m looking hardcore Italian mob wife in my turtlenecked yoga tracksuit (buy new gear).
- I’m the only one wearing a jacket.
- Would I feel comfortable taking this jacket off?
I kept the jacket on as I have been either literally or metaphorically every single day since I arrived in Canada from Thailand seven months ago. The province of Ontario was hit with a heatwave this past summer and I left the house most days in either a jacket or a sweater. This was due in part to the process of acclimating as well as a sense of shame and fear. I didn’t want anyone to see my arms. To this day, I continue to hide them.
I’m 5’3″, 124 lbs (56 kg) and I’m uncomfortable in my body.
Four years ago, I was 5’3″, approximately 124 lbs (56 kg) and comfortable in my body.
The only change in my physical stature is my muscle mass. It has increased substantially after training muay thai in Thailand for three and a half consecutive years. I continue to wear a North American size 5/6. I am the same size.
So what happened? It wasn’t one incident. A single incident or a series of random incidents couldn’t effect me this way, I suspect. I had what I considered a healthy love of self before stepping on that plane to Thailand. My confidence wasn’t impenetrable but I was one who rarely entertained shame towards the physical. My present state is
my response to the cumulative effects of training muay thai full-time and living in Thailand. I lived in Thailand for a total of four years, the first six months occurring approximately a year and a half prior to the following three and a half. I don’t remember being affected the first six months, possibly longer.
To break it down without writing a 3,000 word essay:
- Like Western boxing, muay thai is a weight specific sport that requires a great deal of discipline during training and the management of one’s weight. Many men as well as women struggle with maintaining their required weight (i.e. you don’t want to be that fighter that steps into the ring at a soft 125 lb rather than 115 lb to fight someone who dropped 10 lb to smash you.)
- PMS and the associated water retention is my bane.
- 5’3″ and 124 lbs is considered plus sized in Thailand.
I have no issue with being considered plus sized, it’s the shaming of it I have contention with (directed towards anyone, anywhere).
In Thailand, my weight, thus my body, seemed to be of public property. From factual statements of “fat” thrown in my direction, to teasing, to evil spirited mockery and the occasional upper arm grab, I was called fat more than my mind will currently accept as plausible. The Western bubbled side of my brain tries to dissuade me from thinking that I was perhaps called fat on average, every other day for the two and a half years I lived in Buriram.
The Buriram side of my brain scoffs. It shouts,
“You were called fat more, if you count groups of people who made fun of you. And if you exclude the days you didn’t leave your room.
Or the days you ran your errands as quickly as possible to avoid people. Or the days you waited until past 4:00 pm to go out in public because that’s when the people who lived in the country went home.”
There was a definite decrease in public opinion at night.
So how often did fat shaming in Thailand happen in any form? Too often.
Examples:
- Being fitted for a body brace in a Chiang Mai hospital after fracturing my spine whilst the attending nurses laughed with one another about how fat I was (not realizing I understood them).
- Going out on a first date to have my date ask me how much I weighed. When I told him, he began to give me a speech about how I needed to go down to 103 lb (47 kg) – 108 lb (49 kg) to be beautiful like Thai women. He later would call me on various occasions to ask how much I weighed, if I was eating a lot and to tell me how much he liked thin women. I stopped answering his calls. He wasn’t the only Thai guy who expressed interest in me that followed a similar pattern.
- Parking my motorbike to eat lunch. The woman attending the food stall looked at me horrified. She came running to me on the street, grabbed my arms and screamed in my face, “WHY ARE YOU SO FAT?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”.
- Constantly having people not believe I was a Thai boxer. Why? Because I was too fat.
To keep this piece the intended less than 3,000 words, I’ll omit the plethora of other examples. I will also do this to keep my anger levels low.
Most Thai nationals I met seemed to not understand Foreign women’s bodies, particularly ones like mine with a large waist to hip ratio. As one muay thai trainer exclaimed while massaging me, “You’re not fat! You’re strong!”. He had spent over a year prior believing I was fat.
Although fat can be used in conjunction with cute in Thai culture and for some, a compliment if they haven’t seen you for awhile (i.e. you look well taken care of), often the way it was directed towards me wasn’t in this fashion. Fat, as I was fat, was undesirable and humorous, aka less, not cute. My fatness made me less beautiful and to some muay thai trainers, lazy. My perceived fatness was the physical manifestation of my disrespect towards them.
It meant that I didn’t appreciate their teachings, I didn’t take muay thai seriously, and/or I wasn’t training hard enough. If I was, I wouldn’t be fat. My fear? If my trainer(s) thought I didn’t respect them, they wouldn’t train me with intention.
The diet pill industry is very lucrative in Thailand and aimed towards nationals. It’s not only Westerners that don’t consider it a compliment to be called fat.
I don’t know how many Thai men I had to educate on PMS and the associated water retention.
I don’t know how many times I was mocked.
Okay, less than 3,000 words….
So I’m back in Canada and I feel better about my body although not remotely back to where I used to be. Why? I really don’t know, but that’s where I’m at. This is something I would have never seen coming and probably didn’t realize was happening to the extent that it was until something inside me eroded.
The Positives
What helped keep me together in Thailand, what I’m grateful for and how I’ve benefited from this situation:
- I’m grateful for the African American and West Indian women who are unapologetic and proud of their thick thighs and big backsides, the men who love them and the music industry that profits from them. Thank-you YouTube for transporting them across the planet.
- I’m deeply appreciative of my female friends, both Western and Eastern (Japanese) who offered support as some of you were going through similar issues. I’m deeply appreciative of my Thai friends who were also supportive (male and female).
- I’ve become more aware and empathetic towards the men and women who live with this stigma daily, wherever they are.
Tuesday, January 8, 2013
I didn’t come home with either anorexia or bulimia, rather I took a hit to my self-esteem and I suspect I suffered from hardcore body dysmorphia for awhile. It continues to improve as time passes.
Updated:Â To learn how to distinguish between sports-specific weight management and an eating disorder, please read my interview with Mia Tannous, Health Promotions Manager at the Bulimia Anorexia Nervosa Association.
For Thailand solo travel and safety tips, in addition to Thailand information you won’t find in traditional tourist guides, please visit my post Tips For Women Traveling To Thailand.
i’ve dealt with this as well.
i’m 5’3″
110 lbs
25 waist
32 c
american size 0/2
i found i started hiding as well. there is a weird balance to strike between being declared fat & being stalked b/c of my “face like baby” & “sexeeeee bodeeeeee”. it’s incredibly disorienting. i’m still here,
hi mariegael,
it’s interesting, while i was in thailand, friends and i were convinced people could notice a 1 kg weight gain or loss – we even joked people were able to notice less of a fluctuation. being that i trained, i always had access to a scale at the gym – not once did someone say i gained or lost and was wrong. not once. i agree that it’s a weird balance.
Classic yet raw post on the mind of a conscious female traveller in Thailand. As a male who has only lived in America, I tried to think of ways to compare myself to this judgement. The closest thing I could think of was: “How much is your salary/net worth?” But this question is only asked a handful of times a month.
In your case, it is a more severe and deeper judgement. The fact that they label you from the first sight is brutal, you don’t even have to say one word or you can’t even defend your self(even though you should have no need to). To have it shape your schedule is a mind-fuck of harassment. Fat? Girl you are freaking fit, with trained bone density that mimics a baseball bat of a roundhouse thai-kick.
Laura, with your poignant writing, I’m in awe of the various layers of judgement you had to be “weighted” down by.
-Pretty westerner? Whore who takes all of Thai men because they are promiscuous by default.
-Toned athlete? Must be fat because those girls are straight up HATING! I hate beauty defined by Asian females, it caters to royalty which is essentially useless. The qualities of being docile pale, and thin are praised. They have nothing else to do but talk shit.
-Female Thai Fighter? She can’t be serious, she just wants free training and preferential treatment with our champion trainer.
-Farang? Let’s try to hassle her because she most likely doesn’t speak Thai. Hmm, this is the only one actually where I can see you defend yourself with your ability to speak and understand Thai.
—
To end my rambles, I just want to say thank you for keeping it real with this blog. Your adventurous spirit is very compelling and it inspires me to take on my own journey wherever it may be on my own.
Hey Dan,
Always great to hear from you on the site. Thank-you for the above.
Can’t say I’ve been training here long, just a couple months, but I’m already getting comments from trainers about my weight. Perhaps the most blatant one was 3 weeks into my stay at a Bangkok camp. A group of us, trainers and some falang nak muay together, went out on the town, and toward the end of the night after drinks were imbibed, one of the trainers told me that I was fat when I first showed up to the gym, but have since lost weight and am starting to look pretty good, and oh boy if I stay another month at the gym I will look SO GOOD!, he said. I found it rather amusing that in one fell swoop he managed to compliment me, insult me, and make me realize that yes, trainers train you, but they also look at you as a potential sexual partner. Maybe they DO look at you as a trainer should look at a nak muay for their fighting strengths and weaknesses, but for sure they are also on the prowl for potential hook-ups, it seems. And I’m not limiting it to just trainers who are on the prowl. That same night, one of the falang nak muay with us also tried his luck with me (no dice).
Honestly, I don’t see how this gym hook-up culture can be avoided. Yes. it makes me uncomfortable to know that I’m being sized up sexually by some of the trainers (and other nak muay of course), but how do you get around it? I have come to accept that I am a woman in a mostly male sport, and when you train and sweat and fight and laugh and spend time with all these same people every day, of course attractions are going to appear. I imagine all gyms are basically the same in this regard — but some gyms are better than others at reigning it in. After my night out with the trainers and falang nak muay, I was a bit nervous and wary of what training would be like and if anything inappropriate would happen at the gym, but much to my relief, it was all business at the gym (maybe because I made it clear that night that I would NOT go home with anyone or take anyone home with me). I do not intend to date anyone at my gym, but I would like to be able to go out with my trainers and fellow nak muay every once in a while. Otherwise it would be a pretty lonely existence here.
As far as being “fat” in my gym goes, I’m sure they all think I’m fat but so far they have been so kind as to point it out indirectly, with the exception of the trainer as written about above. Often I’ll be told I should run more. Sometimes I read into that that they’re saying I should run more because I’m fat. But truth be told, running more would benefit my training, so I really should run more. It doesn’t bother me that much, them thinking I’m fat. At least, not yet. I’ve lived in Asia for a while now (used to live in China), so I’m pretty used to people thinking I’m fat at 5’5″ and 138 pounds (current weight after working an office job for the last 2 years), though I’ll probably get back to my active weight of 124 pounds pretty soon if I keep doing what I came here to do, and that’s train every day.
Would love to hear anyone else’s thoughts on any of this.
thanks so much for talking about this topic. its crazy how much comments like this – mostly from not really well educated people (i dont wanna be racist, but this is my experience) – affect you and will for a longer period.
i wrote some mails with you prior to this comment when i spent several months in thailand last year. i am back home now for about 6 months and so insecure about my weight, appearance, … i’m a girl with a normal body, maybe now with a little bit too much weight caused of lack of training back home, but everybody tells me i should keep my mouth shut cause i am constantly thinking about food, losing weight, what to eat, working out, worrying about my weight, not feeling comfortable.
even when i am back in western civilization with no interest of going back to thailand (even i miss training a lot..) for those months, i am sure that this behaviour and bad talking from thai people – which i am glad that i am not the only one who had to live with (even i dont wish this anybody else) – is also part of their culture, importance of visual appearance like white skin, doll face, girly clothes and what they are being teached already as a child.
i am so happy that i had the possibility to travel and make all the experiences i could last year – but i am sure that those 7 months also left a big scar on my self esteem. i am trying very hard to feel comfortable and get rid of my eating disorder (dieting, not drinking alcohol, eating paleo, working too much, binge eating, sweets and chocolate by night, low carb days, starting again….) the fact that you know about the cultural discrepancy and that only happens in your mind is even more disturbing in my opinion as i am sure i dont look fat but still have those rude comments they told me everyday (random people touching my arms telling me fat wouldnt be beautiful, food stall owners talking about my fat butt, friends of friends asking why i had such fat legs if i trained everyday…). my friends told me i was looking freakingly fit and toned which i considered as honest and true when i was watching photos from back then. a thai friend – married to a french guy – gave me once the advise not to care so much as i would already know that those people would not tell the truth and western girls would just have another body form (shoulder, hips, etc.). i am not sure if i will be happier when i lose some kilos or if i can accept they way i am looking cause this is truly damaging my self-confidence.
hi karin,
nice to see you on the site again. i completely remember our emails. i think this all can get better with time, if you’re open to it / keep the positive reinforcement of telling yourself you’re fine as you are. i’m with you though – it’s a difficult task. blatant ridicule and objectification damages in ways i know i couldn’t have foreseen. much support from canada.
Feeling your pain, ldf!
-From a 117 lb fat chick in Osaka
noooooooooooo….. sorry to hear! i thought japan was a safe(r) zone.
I get that everyday at home. I should just punch him in the face. I know your pain girl! You know how bad I have body dysmorphia. My entire life and I was not “fat” my entire life, I just had a healthy face “chubby cheeks”. So now all I do is hate myself everyday.
big hugs wanda. twice.
xoxo love
http://jezebel.com/5992866/dont-call-people-fat-in-front-of-your-kids-unless-you-really-want-to-screw-them-up
I hear you, ldf! I’m a US size 4 (5’7”, 130 lbs), and I was ‘fat’ by the my camp’s standards. When I first arrived, I was happy I couldn’t understand what was being said about my body because I knew that things certainly were being said. Just before I had to leave Thailand and interrupt my training for a while, my trainer said: ‘your body look better now; when you first come, you were very fat, not beautiful; now ok.’
I have been doing sports with a lot of emphasis on weight for as long as I can remember, I have been bulimic for 12 of those years, so the comment troubled me. I felt like I had been getting better until I heard him say those words. Perhaps, it was because his opinion of me – my technique, my strengths and weaknesses – had been so important in training, It upset me deeply that that opinion should have been a negative one. Worse still, he had nothing to say about my progress in muay thai; apparently, I was just less fat and less ugly now than when I first arrived. Who cares about the rest?
It’s time for me to head back to the camp but, unfortunately, I can’t bring myself to do so. I have regained the weight I’d lost during this break in training, and can’t imagine stepping into the gym looking ‘fat’ again, knowing how ‘ugly’ I am in the eyes of someone I have so much respect for. In fact, I am considering going to another gym just because in a new place I would simply be ‘fat and ugly’ and not ‘fat and ugly all over again, 555.’
I will probably end up going back anyway and trying to ignore whatever remarks will doubtless be made about my new old body. However, given my eating disorder, I think it’ll be very tough, and unnecessarily so.
Good luck and much strength to all the women here, training in Thailand and fighting to stay beautiful and worthy in their own eyes!
I’m glad I found this article. I was considering going to Thailand for a semester abroad but now I know I shouldn’t. I will admit that I am seriously unhealthy at 5’2″ and closing in on 200lbs if I haven’t hit that already. I am fat in the United States; never mind in Thailand. To be honest, reading this probably saved my life. I wouldn’t be able to handle 3-4 months of harassment never mind 4 years. Thanks for sharing.
when my sister was looking in thai shops for clothes the girls laughed and said shes too fat! they pointed over to a shop that had a cartoon picture of a pig on the front of it wearing a skimpy bikini said thats where fat girls buy clothes
On my travels in Thailand, I have come cross many fat thai women. Also in the countryside. In the bigger cities, fast food has reared its ugly head and a lot of the thais I know, love fast food. So it seems that Thailand and the Thais will have to be sniggering at themselves much more in the future. This obsession with being skinny, I have always felt is pedophilia-like. I have often wondered about the fact that the majority of Thai men (and absolutely the majority if farang men with thai girlfriends/wives)prefer women that looks like little girls. When you see a big man in his 50’s or 60’s with a woman who has the body of a skinny 10-year old, it makes you react and wonder.It’s really creepy! Maybe this is not politically correct, but it is a fact,though.
Must admit, your raw and honest post here is unnerving. I had no idea it was like that and sadly it makes me cringe. I wish you all the best and renewed confidence! Strong is not only a body type it is a way of mind, and I don’t know your physical strength but through this post I feel you are definitely strong of mind.
Laura,
This is complete horse hockey! I know you and have seen you in person at #TBEX Toronto. If anybody thinks you are fat, they are blind as a bat! I realize you are saying it’s the Thai people predominantly that are saying this, but they seriously need their eyes checked.
I know that people can be cruel and I have been called fat my whole life. In my younger years I let it bother me, but as I aged I said “To Hell With Them”! That’s what you need to do and quit worrying about the issue.
I think you are a beautiful young lady and appear to not have an ounce of fat on you IMHO! Take care and remember there are bigger fish to fry (like making sure your knee heals correctly! Take care.
Mike
Thank you so much Mike!!! I’m also sorry you’ve experienced anything close to it as well!
As someone who has lived in Thailand 16+ years and who has been coming here 40 years as well as living in Taiwan and Hong Kong perhaps I can add some perspective.
At 196cm and 128kg (6’5″ and 282lbs) for more than half my life I had to decide long ago whether I was going to let what others said about my size and weight define how I think about myself.
In the inimitable words of Popeye>: ‘I am’s what I am’s and I ain’ts no more.’
Fuck what others think or say. Period.
I have never known why I have avoided Thailand, until I read this. Must be subconscious. I am probably bordering fat by most cultures, but you certainly are NOT. Thank you for being so honest in your sharing here, I think it’s important for you and readers.
Hi everyone,all you girls who think the Thais are being rude,they don’t mean anything by what they say grow a thicker skin, anyway I’m white and like big girls(not that I’m saying anyone’s big).This what happens when your in Thailand and dealing with the Thais, you girls should have a western man and stop being with a poor impoverished monkey looking issan boy
Also I forget to say Laura, I think u are stunningly beautiful krup.
Read your blio with interest as spent a lot of time in Thailand. I found the attitude i had developed in the UK served me just as well in Thailand as it does everywhere else.
I dont give a toss what people think.
oh my gosh . i dont’ know why i took so long to find this piece.
i totally emphatize with you. as an asian living in an asian country, i have been through that fat shaming all my life. esp when the clothes i wear are like size ‘S’ like in teh states but considered L/XL here
i dont’ do muay thai (would love to try it one day) but i lift so yup am considered one of those girls with chunky thighs, a big waist etc.
so sorry you had to go through this experience but thank you so much for sharing.